The marriage gap describes observed economic and political disparities between those who are married

Marriage

Marriage is a social union or legal contract between people that creates kinship. It is an institution in which interpersonal relationships, usually intimate and sexual, are acknowledged in a variety of ways, depending on the culture or subculture in which it is found...

 and those who are single. The marriage gap can be compared to, and should not be confused with, the gender gap.

Politics and marriage

As part of the marriage gap, unmarried people are "considerably more liberal" than married people. With little variation between professed moderates, married people respond to be conservative 9 percent more, and single people respond to be liberal

Liberalism

Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...

 10 percent more.
Married people tend to hold political opinions that differ from those of people who have never married.

Party affiliation in the United States

In the U.S., being a married woman is correlated with a higher level of support for the Republican Party

Republican Party (United States)

The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...

, and being single with the Democratic Party

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

. There is no significant difference between married people. Thirty-two percent of married people call themselves Republicans and 31 percent say they are Democrats, while among single people, 19 percent are Republicans and 38 percent Democrats. The difference is most striking between married and single women. Married women respond as being Republicans 15 percent more; single women respond as being Democrats 11 percent more.

Political issues

The marriage gap is evident on a range of political issues in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

:

• same-sex marriage
  Same-sex marriage
  Same-sex marriage is marriage between two persons of the same biological sex or social gender. Supporters of legal recognition for same-sex marriage typically refer to such recognition as marriage equality....
  
  , 11% more married people favor Constitutional amendments disallowing it
• abortion
  Abortion
  Abortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to viability. An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced...
  
  , 14% more married people favor completely banning it
• school vouchers, 3% more married people favor them

Marriage and cohabitation

It is not clear that legally or religiously formalized marriages are associated with better outcomes than long-term cohabitation. Part of the issue is that in many western countries, married couples will have cohabited before marrying, so that the stability of the resulting marriage might be attributable to the cohabitation having worked.

"Because we now have the acceptance of long-term cohabitation, people who go into marriage and stay in marriage are a more homogenous group. They are people who believe in certain things that contribute to stability. So the selection effect is really important. Yes, it's true that married couples on average stay together longer than cohabiting couples. But cohabitation is such an unhelpful word, because it covers a whole ragbag of relationships, so it's not really comparable. We're better off talking about formal and informal marriages: those that have legal certificates, and those that don't. Is there any difference between a formal and informal marriage? If we really compare like with like, I'm not sure you'd see much difference."

Interpreting the data

The marriage gap is susceptible to multiple interpretations because it is not clear to what
extent it is attributable to causation

Correlation does not imply causation

"Correlation does not imply causation" is a phrase used in science and statistics to emphasize that correlation between two variables does not automatically imply that one causes the other "Correlation does not imply causation" (related to "ignoring a common cause" and questionable cause) is a...

 and what to correlation

Correlation

In statistics, dependence refers to any statistical relationship between two random variables or two sets of data. Correlation refers to any of a broad class of statistical relationships involving dependence....

. It may be that people who already have a number of positive indicators of future wellbeing in terms of wealth and education are more likely to get married.

The distinction between correlation and causation cuts to the heart of the debate about marriage. The evidence is unequivocal; children raised by married couples are healthier, do better at school, commit fewer crimes, go further in education, report higher levels of wellbeing. It is easy for politicians to deduce - and assert - that married couples therefore produce superior children. But the children do not necessarily do better because their parents are married and there is actually very little evidence that marriage alone, in the absence of anything else, benefits children.

See also

• Achievement gap
  Achievement gap
  Achievement gap refers to the observed disparity on a number of educational measures between the performance of groups of students, especially groups defined by gender, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. The achievement gap can be observed on a variety of measures, including standardized...
  
  
• Balanced parenting (disambiguation)
• Digital gap
• Generation gap
  Generation gap
  The generational gap is and was a term popularized in Western countries during the 1960s referring to differences between people of a younger generation and their elders, especially between children and parents....
  
  
• Income gap
• Opportunity gap
  Equal opportunity
  Equal opportunity, or equality of opportunity, is a controversial political concept; and an important informal decision-making standard without a precise definition involving fair choices within the public sphere...
  
  
• Cost of raising a child
  Cost of raising a child
  The cost of raising a child varies from country to country.-Developing countries:According to Globalissues.org, "Almost half the world — over three billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day." This statistic includes children. On this number, it costs roughly US$900 to raise a child for a year,...
  
  

External links

• Social Science Research Network: Household Specialization And The Male Marriage Wage Premium
• Danish National Institute of Social Research: An Analysis of the Male Marital Wage Differential in Denmark